


Test

by ARMEN15



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: #TrickOrJaq2019, Adventure & Romance, Dark Magic, F/M, Jaqarya, Magic, Teacher-Student Relationship, The Faceless Men, Training
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-31
Updated: 2020-04-14
Packaged: 2021-01-15 15:41:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,711
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21255740
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ARMEN15/pseuds/ARMEN15
Summary: A multichapter WIP that will require time, it goes well with the #TrickOrJaq2019 challenge but can also stand alone.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This work had inspiration from the Black Garden, an installation made for the Orticolario 2019 Exhibition, that is not only a fair of flowers, plants and related items, but also a show of creative garden projects.  
https://orticolario.it/black-garden-viaggio-negli-inferi/

“I don’t like tests.” 

“A girl is right. A man is tired of being tested.” 

“The Waif said brothers are examined every five years.” 

“Just so.” He has already done the math, four years and ten since his previous time; another brother has been tested a week before, and for him it was five and three.

They stop in the middle of the woods to look at the map Jaqen has been given the same morning, after the Elder has taken off their blindfolds; a journey in the darkness by carriage that lasted the whole night.

They have walked at first to climb up a hill, then went down into the forest, on the shores of a small lake. An unknown terrain.  
The atmosphere seems peaceful, but a man has a strange suspicion, he keeps it for himself, not informing Arya about it

It is strange they are tested together, she is scheduled to be admitted to the order in a few weeks and a man believes such a try is not necessary for her, at close distance with her final examination.

A girl has to obey, he repeates Arya since their first meeting, a man named Jaquen H’ghar, a master, has to apply himself the same rule.

His first test was deafness, a week in a world of silence that required all his control. 

His second and last was about fencing, an endless flows of duels inside the training room, against his brothers wearing masks, 

Defeating physically, indeed, but easier to manage than this uncertainty and the real reason Arya is with him. A test for two, together, was heard only once before within the order, involving two brothers, never an apprentice.

He has been extremely careful with the brothers, his face and gestures deprived ov every emotion

They are walking close, so close their clothes are in contact, breeches and jackets, Jaqen needs to feel arya’s presence, his senses are in full alert, a strange restlessness is taking roots inside him. 

Then he understands: there are no sounds, no birds, no wind, no living soul in that part of the forest. 

They reach a glade, short grass and a pathway difficult to follow, so few the traces are on the ground.

After a short walk, they pass under an arch made of branches, partially dried and dark.  
Arya points at the arch with her dagger and Jaqen nods, the silence is becoming too heavy, 

Jaqen fight against the impulse to go back to the beginning of their path, take Arya with him somewhere far from there and forget the test, the faces and the house. 

The sensation makes him sweat and his legs tremble, he stumbles into a fallen branch with his feet and leans against a tree, pretending not to show Arya his distress. 

She relies on him, he is sure, he can not let his doubts prevail upon her complete trust in him.  
After a dozen of steps it is dark all around, half of the trees are burnt , their trunks bare, without leafs, the ground covered in dust. 

Arya grabs his wrist, her fingers dug into his flesh, she feels his pulse quickening, is for the contact or for the place they are into? His hand cover hers, warm and big.

“I’m here.” He reassures her, words that conflict with his worried face.

“This place is strange, there’s danger and magic. Black magic.“

“Are you sure?”

“I feel it. My brother taught me, our parents were angry with him but we used to hide in a tower of Winterfell and he went into a sort of trance and grabbed my hand and I was able to listen to the magic.”


	2. Chapter 2

CH 2

  
A man firmly believes the test is done on purpose, his brothers must know about them, their secret has been discovered.

Fool to think a shared bond could be hidden, fool to believe the brothers would let them live in peace. Is he so full of pride to forget the rules and blur the borders of the House?  
Still he’s sure he can continue his work, with her at his side, he can follows her and the order, together.

He has build his future on this belief, unrealistic and foolish as it may seem, for the first time in his life as a faceless there is a prize to keep close to the heart, one impossible to renounce.

Arya is restless, she turns continuously.

“Jaqen, what do you think?”

“A man is trying to understand if there is a connection.”

“Between this and …us? How can they know?”

The questions linger in the air, too many complications, revelations, a complex situation they are entangled into, together. He has asked her never to speak about it or to reveal what happened that evening. It had to remain private, he is afraid also to discuss with her the topic and still he cannot walk away from her, deny his lovely girl of his touch since that night…

  
\---

  
_In the hut over the hills they used for that mission between shepherds they let the barn door open, so that heat - and smell – would enter the room._   
_Too few logs to lit a good fire, they had to make them last for days, it was hard to find good dry wood on the bare mountains._

_Two cups of red wine, half for her, the rest for him, not enough to get tipsy, enough for her pale cheeks to get a little pink. She wrapped herself in a smelling fur, everything sufficed against the cold._

_He sat close, saw her shivering, for a northern girl a sign of distress and slide himself under the furs._

_She stilled, unsure of what he was doing, why his eyes were so sad and his lips smiling at the same time?_

_“Lovely girl, is it better?”_

_She nodded, not trusting her voice should she speak._

_The closeness gave her a new reason to tremble, until he passed an arm over her shoulders and pulled her to him._

_The more the contact, the less the fear. She was indeed a different kind of girl._

_“Jaqen, what are you doing?”_

_“Warming you.”_

_Then silence, they observed the flames, Jaqen closed his eyes, he felt at peace, listening to her breath._

_When he woke up, later, his head was resting in her lap, her upper back leaning on their sacks, to rest against something softer than stones._   
_His face turned toward her and he smells something t and it hit his brain like a blow._

_She is ripe. And ready. She is a woman, her body is telling him the right time of the month for mating. She is not aware, but her body wants a man._

_He stops breathing, an impulse rises form the deepest part of his mind._

_His stomach clenches for the force of his desire._

_I can and I cannot, his brain repeats for a minute or an hour._

_He knows she’d be wet, open, ready to accept his flesh, not hurt by his first intrusion, welcoming it._

_And there’d be no dangers, no consequences, he is equipped with the right tea: his seed will die inside her and their lives will be untouched and unmarked by a bastard child._

_How can he take her maidenhead during a mission, he thinks, but his body is only listening to hers, sniffing her scent, feeling the softness of her belly and the firmness of her toned legs._

_She is sleeping, no, just resting, little twists of her hands over his shoulders, a sign of activity._

_Would she accept him as her lover, more than a mentor, more than simply a mate?_

_Because it won’t be a rut on the bare ground like animals in heat, his mind imagines a __tender coupling of two bodies, sharing touches, intimacies, they were alone for many years_.

_She is his lovely girl, she deserves something good for once in her life._

_But if she’d refuse his gestures, he’d retreat immediately, without complains or disappointment._

_He listens: her increased heartbeat rate, her faster breaths, a little sigh escapes her lips. He dares, nuzzles his face deeper in her lap, her scent gets stronger, she squirms a little but don’t push him away._

_She’s his. He knows. She knows, since the day he offered her three names. Death for life, life for death._

_Her power over him, since then, he felt bewitched in a way his training never allowed him before._

_His hand moves to touch her back, under the furs, under his cloak she has wrapped around her small frame._

_When fingers meet bare skin, her back arches for the contact._

_Enough for Jaqen to loose his mind, nothing can stop him and he prayed his God she’d welcome more of his gestures._

_Still the willpower, the concentration to be kind and gentle but resolute at the same time, and she leans into him and he feels the luckiest man alive._

_“Trust me, lovely girl. “_

_Clothes opened just to give access, it is cold, warmth is precious and in a short Arya is under him, legs spread out, one bare except for her grey wool socks, the other with the breeches mid tight, his fingers are preparing her and her hands exploring him._

_He gives her few minutes to do so, too strong the need, later she could, if their madness will continue._

_Soon, slowly, he is in her, member, eyes, mouth, brain, he feels only her and she whispers his name and she lets herself go._   
_That strange communion, she wants to partake with him only._

  
\---

  
The fog is a wall around them. Suddenly, enveloping them with silence and grey all around. Arya disappears, her grey eyes takes control of all her face.  
She is made of grey.

Fog that invades lungs, noses, ears, eyes, fog is them and they are made of thick fog. They can’t see arms and legs.

He calls for her and the words disappear the sound is absorbed by the veil he has all around. He’s blind and hits a trunk, a low branch scratches his face, his hands grope, searching for stability and for Arya.

If she can’t hear him she’ll get lost, without him she’s lost and in danger and he’s nothing without her. He was used to be nothing, no name and no face, before she wrote his name on his chest with her lips and it felt like fire was marking him.

He needs her by his side, realizes the power of the touch, the sense he denied himself for so long and she awakened in him since he grabbed her body in the act of love for the first time.

They’re scared, walking in circles without the sight like it happened in their respective trainings.

His heart ached when she woke up blind and he had no courage to tell her it was just for a while, that she’d adapt and get new powers.  
They have the sense of hearing to compensate, their world is wrapped up in cotton, it is dangerous not knowing where they are.

On the brink of a hole, on the edge of a cliff, near a sword or a predator ready to kill.  
Jaqen stops, forces himself to calm down, for her sake and his own.

He needs to find Arya to keep their link, he admits how important is to use all his remaining senses to locate her. Most of all, smell. The fog is humid and humidity exalts the perfumes of the fallen leafs, the wet stones, the mud on the soil. She is clear as cold and ice, she is a subtle scent of the first day of winter.

She’s more used to this blindness, having experimented it a few moons before, she’s steadier on her feet, and less trembling. Arya leans her back against a huge tree, wrap her arms around the trunk and calls her brother’s help to see what she cannot see, she stills and listens to the voice inside her head.

“Brother? Bran?”

A faint whisper, a bird’s wing. “I’m here.”

She feels his voice over her, calm and soothing; Bran is always so, when he uses the ravens.

“I need to find my master.”

“You’ve already found him.”

“There’s only fog around me, Jaqen can’t hear me, black magic, Bran.”

Arya is connected to her brother’s mind, he becomes her light, she can see through the foggy veil that slowly dissolves while she moves.  
Jaqen can’t be far, they have parted for a short time, he can’t walk away too much, he’s sure around; Bran calms her fear, forces Arya to slow down, to think.

“You do want him, don’t you?”

“He’s the one I need. No one before him.”

“And no one after him, sister. Fear not, the same is for him, he values you more than his own life.”

Hearing it from Bran spurs a warm sensation inside Arya’s heart: her choice has been right, her companion, the man she has marked as his own, is worth of her.

“We are tested. Jaqen thinks by purpose.”

“Double faced coin. A test for them, one for you, to see how strong the bond is.”

“He’s mine, Bran.”

“And you are his, body and soul.”

The fog is the impalpable grease that did not let her fingers get what she wants, she feels the items, the wet leaves, the rugged trunks, the cold stones but not the unique warmth that means another one, another body.

Bran drifts away, Arya is alone again in her search, it’s more than simply finding Jaqen, it’s about the importance of the physical side of their bond after the spiritual one they shared since the beginning. They need to trust each other and listen to the flow running through them.

Understanding means clarity, the thick veil disappears and Jaqen is at her side, had been always, she has been too scared to see him.


	3. Chapter 3

The suspended bridge between two steep banks, sharp and covered in slippery musk. No trees to grab, no branches to ease the fall, no bushes to deaden the hit, too deep and wild the river below. “This timber seems fragile.”

Jaqen touches the woods and the ropes, tests the strength and looks back at Arya, who nervously chews her lower lip.

She moves closer to the edge, look down then back at the bridge.

Behind them, the fog, in front of them, unknown dangers.

“It’s another try. A man will go first.”

“No! Me.”

“I must.”

“If the wood is broken or rotten, I’m lighter than you.”

“I can’t let you risk for me.”

Her stubbornness explodes, the rage she has suppressed since their journey has begun.

“They’re testing us, Jaqen! Both of us. Tricking us to make us fail. We can’t and we won’t let them win.”

How sweet and full of hope is to have Arya Stark at his side. These glances of happiness are dear to his rediscovered heart. She is right, they muss pass the test, whatever future awaits them at the end of it.

She starts carefully, each foot probing the planks, hands pulling the ropes to be sure she can continue, sweat on her palms, breathing heavily, Jaqen’s gaze on her back, she can hear the air leaving his clenched teeth with a hiss each time.

She counts twelve steps in front of her, to reach the other side.

Five done, seven to go.

The sixth goes easy.

The seventh he feels danger before her, her foot lands on a crevice of the wood that breakes in two, her hands grip the rope but her weight pulls her down, between two planks and he jumps, unafraid, forgetting the caution that has ruled all his life, he launches himself forward, lands behind her, twisting the rope around his left arm, scratching his skin while she is loosing grip and the river down increases the flow.

The magic is getting worse.

A breath to stabilize himself, Jaqen forgets the sliver deeply in his calf and half turns his upper body to see her, kneeling on the swinging piece of wood and extending an arm to reach hers.

“Take my hand!” He shouts, a chance only to save her, time is short.

She lifts her gaze from the dangerous river, one of the ropes is loosening and it means the bridge is close to break in two and she will fall and fall further and disappear.

He knows, if she’s gone he’ll follow: he cannot be the cause of her death and the same for her, when he drank instead of Arya from the ampoule, she cried and shouted over his lifeless body.

Ironic, after so many deaths he caused, he considers a girl’s life more important than his own.

He reinforces the rope around his arm and the pain increases, blood from the cuts; he resists because it is their lifeline, she gains a few centimeters until his fingers touch hers.

She pushes herself up, he tenses more to get her palm, her legs kick in the air and her wrist is at his reach; when he grabs it, all his body is the hand that lifts her up.

And she is bound to him, they lie on the edge of the rift while the wind twists and shakes the bridge that breaks in two, crashing hard against the sides of the deep valley. A last gust, then the wind stops and suddenly dark clouds bring rain.

____

_Desperately he is above her, in her, the adrenaline still high after the recent fear._

_They find a small stone temple, half in ruin, home of birds and shelter for animals, a place to hide from the storm, soft ground and fallen leafs under her back and he is buried to the core in her warmth._

_Jaqen wants more, to became her, a fool, impossible target to reach, to envelope her inside him so that she’d be no more in danger like on the bridge._

_This wanton is too strong to bear, the test is lifting their relationship up to a higher level, more than simply body and mind; illusion to think the others are unaware, they have become soul mates, evident for the brothers._

_Arya meets him, ardor for ardor, desire for desire, a young woman indeed, her skin is burning ice under his, her mouth his source of life._

_“I can’t loose you.” His confession leaves his lips, the first time he admits it out loud._

_“You have me.” She answers, forcing her hips higher to feel him more, her arms around his back, to keep him close, her trained body ready for his strength._

_Arya has witnessed the act of love before in various ways, then she has experimented it with him – her one, her only – but this is like exchanging skins._

_He feels her inside his body, she rolls her eyes, is she doing another magic, one that transcends their flesh to reach every cell of the other?_

_Jaqen doesn’t care, repeating her name over and over, to the wind, to the sky above, to the Gods that have brought him to her and her to him and it is not enough, never enough, until he lets himself go and she moans loud, her nails in his flesh and nothing else matters, not cold, not fear, not even death._

_The embrace remains, he cannot part from her, needs the contact, he tries only to shift his weight a little not to crush her, but she keeps her steel arms around him and he understands her request. Mad, impossible dream to have her. His wows, his training, his faceless self become abstaclers to the pulling toward a lovely girl._

_“They want to tear us apart.” Jaqen declares, but she shakes her head._

_“I’m not sure. Before, during the fog, I had a contact with my brother.”_

_“The sensitive?”_

_“He was smiling. I asked him why, he just told me to be brave.”_

_“And a girl thinks it is a positive thing?”_

_“I trust Bran. Now sleep, we cannot return through the bridge, only forward.”_

\-----

Red drops. Bloody rain drops everywhere. On her skin, on his face. Tiny rivulets falling and staining and cleaning bodies at the same time.

Blood they caused to spill. Their own. Mixed.

Between the hundreds of thorns hidden under the leaves of the bush he holds her hand and cannot see where they are going, small needles tear their clothes, thorns go deeper and scratch skin, make blood.

Her victims’ blood, washed, her wounds’ blood, stopped, her moon blood, cleaned, her maiden blood, drank; Jaqen has witnessed everything she has to offer him, he was there, now he can’t imagine to partake the last possible blood he’d get from her, delivering a child made together. It is too terrible to think about it until they are into the House. It will be the last wall they could break together.

He must offer his own share of the crimson liquid, must shield her, his body is bigger, larger, he can protect her through this path made of blood and make sure she’s untouched.

It’ s his duty, as her teacher, as her lover.

She’s small, young, strong, she’s a woman, without doubts. The first time they met, disguised as a young boy, a messy haircut meant to cover her wolf eyes, her dirty brown clothes, her breeches stuffed with a rag to show a fake crotch.

The others believed in Arry, not Jaqen, never. If she was an Arry, a true one, their lives would be simpler, smarter, they would follow the flowing of water in a river, not her blood flow that links her to her femininity and him to her, for all the time the God will let them have.

Will their blood heal the ground, water the brown grass, clean the ashes of the past?

Blood running to preserve life, blood spilled to cause death? A double purpose for the same fluid, Jaqen recalls all the times he killed, stored in neat order in his mind and never revisited until now.


	4. Chapter 4

Fire.  
First the smell. Then the sound of crakling and falling trees.   
Last the heat.   
Arya’s head turns right, left, than right again., spinning in search of the smoke provenience.   
She’s scared, more than ever.   
Girl of ice, fire is her worst enemy and Jaqen tries to calm her. He’s more used to the element, he knows how dangerous it can be, but he is able to use his rational mind.   
This trial is for her, specific, to make her explode in pieces of crazy nervousness.  
And the arid smell is from everywhere, flames run fast and the way back is closed, too, and Jaqen knows what their only salvation can be.   
“Listen to me, we’re surrounded.”  
She runs in circles on the grass, around him, felling trapped, a mouse chased by a big red cat, her brain explodes in her skull, her heart beats with a maddening tune.   
Jaqen grabs her arm, forces her to look at him, holds her close to his chest.   
“We’ll die!”  
She screams, a cry of pure panic, he thinks the masters are cruel indeed, putting fire around a girl born in the cold. She fears it more than anything else. Not the fire in his hair, in his eyes when they are together, but the real flames, those that burns skin and flesh and bones.  
“We won’t if you do what I say. We need to create a circle of soil to offer no more nutrition to the flames, so the fire will pass over us and we’ll survive.”   
“You’re crazy! We’ll be burned and die whatever we…”  
“Lovely girl, now follow me. They want to test our main difference, fire and ice.”  
Jaqen scrolls her thin frame to wash away her nervousness and make her concentrate on him only.  
If she is lost, he’ll get lost, too, time is short, action is needed.   
Arya regains a bit of self control and Jaqen draws with his boot a circle on the grass, a couple of fingers deep, the ground is softer than he feared and he gives instructions to Arya meanwhile.  
“We need to get rid of the grass and of the first layer of soil.”   
She looks at him like he is a crazy man but don’t protest anymore.  
“Half circle is yours, half mine. Use your feet, your hands, the dagger, whatever you can get but be fast, we have few minutes.”  
Jaqen’s foot at work, his hands lift the patches of grass and throw them as far as he can.   
She uses Needle, sharp and fast movements to cut the sods and form little mounds, his throws are longer. The longer the better.  
There’s water, a stream on the left.   
“Go and soak your clothes into the water, it will help. Take my cloak. And your hair, too, wet them.”   
The cold water is a balm for her body, she lies into it then rolls on her front, his cloak under her frame to drench it full.  
He calls her back and runs into the creek where it’s wider, better for a tall man, leaving his boots and their bags into, under some stones. Better wet than burned, he thinks  
When she get near him, her dear face too close to prevent a chill along his spine, his pretended bravado no more so brave, Jaqen makes Arya lie under him inside the circle, keeping her protected, the wet cloak covering both; only a little space to breath between his face and hers.  
“Keep a piece of my tunic over your nose, it will be a filter, letting us breathe.”   
She’s trembling and he cannot hide his own fear, Jaqen heard about this technique, never used it for real, never met someone who experimented it and survived.   
The heat increases, he sweats and starts to cough, worried because she must suffer more, a Northerner unused to high temperatures.   
He prays her cold blood will help her.   
She tries to get herself free from his grasp, but his arms pin her down, the flames are around them, maybe the circle had to be bigger, the cut deeper, he feels her tears that dry immediately, she fights, the impulse to search for air, shorts frequent breaths to use as little oxygen as she can.   
Jaqen is afraid, too, scared to loose the only thing he has ever desired for himself, the only gift he has allowed himself as a grown up man. Irony of giving the red gift so many times and now fearing, trembling, crying to be parted from her life.   
Then suddenly there is silence, the flames are gone, around them burned grass and trees and small embers still red are scattered everywhere.   
A wind gust cleans the air.   
Jaqen needs to stand but his back hurts a lot, so he kneels beside Arya who can breath again fully without his weight; she turns around him and his back is red and sore, the skin is burned in correspondence of large holes of the cloak.   
Arya runs to the bags, he carries often oils and ointments, she hopes first the water and then the fire hasn’t destroyed the metal box. It is hot on the outside and when she opens it the content is intact, her fingers makes circles on Jaqen’s back, whose lips are tight and sealed. If he suffers, no moans escape.  
His sacrifice has saved them, not without a price, claimed by the fire.  
\---  
The burned skin changes color, shades of purple, she applies ointments often, soft touches and she knows his body with closed eyes. But it’s not a body, it’s the sum of things that makes him, , unique, strong and hers.   
Jaqen shows Arya which herbs are useful, there are so many into the woods.   
He teaches, she learns, nothing new since she entered the House.   
They survive, together.  
She massages, he heals, little by little, she makes him eat fruits and edible leafs, his discomfort subsides, her experience increases.  
His mind roams free, what can be the next part, for how long they would be imprisoned there.   
They’ve lost notion of time, of space, night and day mix together, some paths are so dark Jaqen cannot decide what’s up above the roof created by the weaving of branches.  
Black magic indeed, forces they are tested against; Arya tries in vain to contact Bran again.   
They are alone, they have each other. A touch, a hug, a kiss, one more, another one, when they stop, tired, never defeated.


	5. Chapter 5

The beast is heard miles before it is visible.   
They move carefully, their scent in the air, no matter how much they try to change direction, they are forced to go south.   
Arya is silent, in concentration, walking beside Jaqen who has his sword drawn.  
Memories she barely tries to erase come to the surface, children playing in the fields outside Winterfell with pups and young wolves.  
The monster with dark fur, white fangs and steam from its nostrils stands high on two paws only, roaring its rage around the forest. It is more than a wolf, one, two, three heads, turning in each direction, ruling the wind and the rain that stopps when its growl becomes a pitch.   
Arya recognizes the eyes, she won’t be wrong and cannot be wrong.  
No more Nymeria, her faithful friend, this is a beast, an animal made to kill, between Arya and the gat at the end of the garden.   
Arya is afraid to get into her mind, but she has to try nevertheless, their survival depends from her ability to do so.   
Jaqen sees when she tilts her head back and wants to stop her.  
He touches her arm and Arya lets out her own growl.   
Jaqen retreats, defeated, takes a fighting position, ready to attack the beast if Arya is in danger.  
Arya feels the change, she becomes forest, rock, river, wood, beast, feet are chained to the earth body powerful and savage, head up in the air.   
Grey eyes meet grey and each animal smells the other, they stand at short distance, both ready to jump.   
Nymeria is the first to start the silent dialogue.   
“Give me the man and you’ll be free.”  
“I can’t.”  
“He’s a killer, got bloody hands, he’s not pack like you.”  
“My family never asked me to betray someone.”  
The wolf turns her head to the man, standing behind, Jaquen lowers his eyes, no challenges from him.  
“He’s no one, not worth, useless, he’s not a Stark.”  
“The remaining Starks are too far from here. He’s my pack now.”  
Is Nymeria really her or a projection of the masters? Drugs, seeds, smokes that can take control of Arya, not a warging like she used to do?   
“Aren’t you ashamed? A man without a face and a history is no good for a lady like you.”   
“Stop! I’m not a lady. I never was at home, I’ll never be. He’s my friend, I trust him.”  
“Friend not family, you’re here only to keep him warm, I smell him on you. He’ll dump you once tired of you.”  
“He saved me, he’s still there. With me. I’m not giving him up, Nymeria. You have to understand. You all must.”   
“You gave up me!”  
Jaqen tenses, the wolf is getting closer to Arya, baring its huge white teeth, something is not going well in the warging, if only a man could hear them.  
“I saved you, they’d kill you if I had not renounced you. I sent you away safely to get back to your pack., to protect you! Like me and Jaqen do protect each other.”  
“It was my task to protect you, I was born for it.”  
A whine, a sad sound and Jaqen sees a head has disappeared.   
“No other wolf could protect me like you, I swear it , Nymeria.”  
“I wanted to stay with you.”  
“Me, too, but.. I had to go to a place too dangerous for you. Forgive me, I wanted you to live, although away from me. I did it for you. I love you.”  
Now two wolves were facing each other, one head only.  
“I wanted to run with you again, in our woods.”  
“We’ll do it again, Nymeria, I promise , but I need you to let us walk across the gate. So one day I can return home with you.”   
Arya cannot continue anymore and she retreats into herself, falling on her knees for the effort. She never has felt so tired after warging.  
The animal crouches in front of her owner, who passes a hand over the furry head.   
Jaqen lets out the breath he is holding, keeping his position, afraid of a sudden charge of the aniumal toward him.   
When the wolf offers her paw to Arya, she turns to Jaqen and invited him into.  
“This is my wolf, Nymeria. And this is Jaqen.”   
She takes his left hand and brings the palm up for Nymeria to memorize the scent.   
“We can pass through the gate now.”   
\---  
Sat on a flat stone on the other side, the Elder nods when the trio appeared.   
Jaqen’s face steels, more tensed for the decision of his Master than for the trial they have endured.   
The steps to the hooded figure are few and too many questions crowd into his mind.  
What if Arya is sent away from the House, will he follow her in whatever vengeance she is still planning? Or if he is considered unworthy to remain a brother, will she stand by his side, a once nameless man afraid of a future he never dreamed about? A future inside the order, together? Or a travel to her home land, far North, following the call of House Stark?   
“They say you can never be wise and be in love at the same time. It seems you have disproved the mot.”  
The Elder stands and faces both, his face betrays nothing.   
“Brother, you have passed your third test. Girl, you’ll be admitted in two weeks time. Wolf, there is a place for you in the yard. Umma will feed you, too.”   
It seems they have a future together, whatever it will unravel.


End file.
